Frequently Asked Questions - AMS Payment

AMS Payment is part of the new Application Management System and is the Commission's secure online portal for application payments. All application payments are now made via AMS Payment using Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT). AMS Payment can be accessed here in the Online Services section of the website.

Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT) is an electronic transfer of money from one bank account to another. It should be noted that although the Commission uses a Pre-Authorized Debit (PAD) agreement. Each payment is initiated by the applicant's ePay Payer security role before payment is made.

You can only pay by cheque while transitioning to EFT. However you are still responsible for monitoring invoices in AMS Payment and submitting your cheques for each invoice.

While setting up your PAD agreement, companies can submit the letter of authorization enabling your ePay Financial Admin. This will allow the ePay Financial Admin to grant the ePay Payer role to other users. This also allows your ePay Financial Admin and ePay Payers to monitor the system and print or download invoices and send payment via cheque for those invoices. Those invoices will then be marked as paid by the Commission when your cheque is received. The Commission will no longer mail invoices to companies. The Commission will only follow up with companies if payment is not received within 30 days.

In order to setup an AMS Payment account the Commission requires the following documents to be completed:

A letter, on company letterhead, sighed by a company executive (for example a CEO, CFO, or VP) authorizing a person to be designated as the ePay Financial Admin for the purpose of managing the AMS Payment account. The ePay Financial Admin role has overall control of the payment account for the company and can assign ePay payers to the account. An example letter of authorization is on the AMS Payment page on our website. This letter can be sent ahead of your PAD agreement form, enabling you to setup access to the Payment module.

A Pre-authorized Debt (PAD) agreement form which can also be downloaded from our website

A void cheque or letter from the bank matching the account information on the PAD agreement form

No. Payments are user-initiated like any other online payment. Staff that are assigned the ePay Payer role must select an invoice and go through the payment process before the transaction is submitted to the bank and money is debited from the company’s account. The Commission cannot authorize funds to be removed from a company's account.

This documentation can be emailed to the Commissions finance department at finance@bcogc.ca however please note that email is not considered a secure form of sending information. To ensure your privacy and security please mail or courier the information to the following:

Users can be assigned one, or more, of three different roles associated with AMS Payment. The roles are:

ePay Financial Admin: This role is the administrator for the company EFT account. Users assigned this role are able to manage and update the EFT account and assign up to three payment level authorizations to users with the ePay Payer role.

ePay Payer: This role is assigned to users who are able to review invoices and make payments. Users with this role must be provided an Authorization Code by the ePay Financial Admin that enables them to make a payment up to a maximum amount.

Applications: This is an existing role in KERMIT that carried over to AMS system when it launched. Company Administrators will continue to assign this role to users who will prepare and submit applications. This role allows users to view invoices in AMS Payment but not to edit financial information or make a payment.

The ePay Financial Admin role can set up to three authorization codes each with a maximum payment limit for payments to be submitted to the Commission by the ePay Payer role. To do this, the ePay Financial Admin role must log onto AMS Payment, click "Edit EFT Bank Information” in the far left navigation panel. The resulting screens will enable the ePay Financial Admin to set three maximum payment amounts and Authorization Codes.

The person in your company who is assigned the ePay Financial Admin role can assign ePay Payer roles in KERMIT. The ePay Payer roles are assigned a maximum amount they are allowed to pay. If you cannot submit a payment, please check with your ePay Financial Admin on whether your maximum amount needs to be adjusted.

The Authorization Code is assigned by the ePay Financial Admin role. If you do not have an Authorization Code, check with your ePay Financial Admin. The ePay Financial Admin role is able to create three Authorization Codes in the EFT Account details screen in AMS Payment.

AMS Payment keeps track of periods of inactivity. If you are inactive on the site for 15 minutes your session will expire and you will be required to log in again. This is a security feature to ensure your identity and information is protected.

Commission online systems use industry best practices to protect all information collected. Secure transfer protocols are used to encrypt data sent back and forth between system users and the Commission’s service. The EFT information is only viewable and editable to certain security roles assigned by the company.

However, as a user there are certain precautions to employ to keep your information private:

Always keep your user name and password secret and never save them in your browser.

No, the Commission cannot debit bank accounts. Users with the ePay Payer role initiate the payment. The Commission then batches all initiated payments once a day and submits them to the bank for processing.

A: Invoices in Payment Pending status are unpaid invoices that have been generated in ePayment. These invoices require review before they can be paid. Invoices in Accepted status are invoices which an ePay Payer has reviewed and completed the Pay Now process. Payment is typically withdrawn from your account 2-5 business days after completing the Pay Now process and converting the invoices status from Payment Pending to Accepted.

There is no change to how the Commission processes amendment invoices. Currently, an amendment invoice will be generated from our Victoria office after the decision maker has made a determination on an amendment application. This will then appear as an invoice to be paid in AMS Payment.

There is no change to how the Commission processes amendment invoices at this time. Currently, an amendment invoice will be generated after a decision maker has made a determination on an amendment application. These invoices will appear in our AMS Payment dashboard. For more information on AMS Payment see the webpage here, or check out the FAQs below.